


Slipped Away

by Hopestallion



Series: teen wolf songs [10]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Avril Lavigne inspired, Death, Erica and Jackson friendship, Grave, Kanima, Other, Slipped away inspired, Song Inspired, graveyard, mentions Gerard, mentions Matt, mentions death, mentions of Jackson's biological parents, mentions of grave, mentions of pre- Teen wolf friendship.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-11
Updated: 2015-11-11
Packaged: 2018-05-01 05:18:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5193695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hopestallion/pseuds/Hopestallion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jackson comes back to Beacon Hills to close the open chapters of his life, he walks past the many places he's been at and had memories off. All that while remembering the best friend, he'd pushed away during early childhood days, to find out her death and live with it. This is purely Alternate Universe and in no way canon kind of? Like the happenings in the TV show stay the same, with the difference that Jackson and Erica were childhood friends. </p><p>I never really wrote Jackson before, so sorry if he's OOC kinda... <3</p><p>the song used is "Slipped away" by Avril Lavigne</p>
            </blockquote>





	Slipped Away

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my first language, so I am sorry if there are punctuation mistakes or vocabulary mistakes <3 xxx Lana  
> This piece is also written for my best friend Steph <3 i love you and I'm sorry for the sad thingy :D

He came back to a broken world, people dead he had wished to see one last time again, other's left to deal with a new life and the holes Beacon Hills had left in them. Jackson had come back to fix things, had thought about his life, found his anchor. Just to come back, for it to be pulled out of his grasp, before he even could lay a finger on it. On her.

Derek was no longer Beacon Hills alpha and if anyone had asked the Whittemore, he would have said. He had kind of expected it to happen, the position to shift to Scott. Like gravitation, things had rounded up around the McCall. The pack, the supernatural, everything had somehow fallen back on McCall and Jackson.... had slowly seen why.

Different than Derek had been with him and the others back then, Scott just wanted friends and safety. However he had soon learned, that it had all come with prices. Too harsh for any of them to pay, in their young age. And yet they had to live with blood, other's brought onto their hands and they had to wash off. Like Stiles who had to live with Allison's death on his hands, or how Derek had to live with almost all his beta's dead, before reaching adulthood.

Jackson had come back to do right by her and had disappointed utterly. While they had broken apart far earlier than the supernatural happenings, even before he'd been with Lydia. She had been on his mind so long, that she had almost haunted him in London. Back then he hadn't known of her predicament, hadn't known about anything that had happened in Beacon Hills. His parents and he had decided it would be for the best to not contact anyone. Just to clear his mind, to come back to the person he truly wanted to be. The conclusion, coming to the only acceptable thing. To do what he'd done right, to repair the cracks, to start over.

He wondered if Erica ever knew how much she was missed now, that when he'd gone back to Beacon Hills high school, to see her and Boyd's Initials missing on the god damn shelf. That he had almost tore the school apart, on his search for a god damn permanent marker to leave their initials. Why did no one think, of those that were left behind? Why was Allison's name on there, but not Erica's or Boyd's. Granted he hadn't been close with Boyd, but he'd been with Erica, before he'd been the best in Lacrosse. Before he'd been team captain, before the strain had been too much, the ego catching up on him, to turn him away from her. To turn him to meaninglessness and the firm believe to be in love. When it had been a crush? Maybe love at one point, but nothing comparing to the intensity of her brown eyes on him.

He found himself walking down the hallway of the empty school, summer break, no one was there to annoy him. The other's had graduated that summer, he'd been there. Had seen Lydia give her speech and the other's receive their diploma. Jackson had gotten his in England, had had enough time to study and focus, to graduate early. However he'd promised Lydia to be there and watch. Now everyone was busy with moving, which left him enough time on his own to walk around.

Remembering the happenings in the library, when he'd gone Kanima on them. When something in the back of his head had been screaming, when he'd tried to fight against Matt's control. Erica..., she had had a seizure that day, he still possessed the memories of the Kanima. Once the master's role was broken, he'd gotten back all the missing parts, everything Matt and Gerard had made him forget. Jackson knew every single gruesome deed he'd done.

**Nana, nanana, nana**   
**I miss you, miss you so bad**   
**I don't forget you, oh it's so sad**   
**I hope you can hear me, I remember it clearly**

His feet carried him across the hallway, through a door and towards the lacrosse lockers and showers. The fight with Scott, how he'd beaten the shit out of the werewolf, or well other way round. They hadn't actually come to a conclusion about that one, a tie. She'd pulled him away, held him with an arm across his collarbone, a tight grip on his biceps.

Her hair had fallen over his shoulder, across his cheek and he still could remember the scent of it. There was apples, she always had the scent of apples with her, the scent of the lipstick she used and the perfume she liked to rub behind her ear. Because her mother used to do it, when they were just children, to humor Erica. She would always rub a dot of it behind Erica's ear and tell her that she was smelling like a princess. Jackson remembered it all.

How despite believing not to be supernatural, he somehow had caught all those announces from her. The tremble of her muscles, as she tried to hold him back. Her heaving breathing behind him, a growl too low to be picked up by anyone, in his ear. Her eyes flashing golden and then back to their brown. And then, slowly letting go of him as he was gaining back his self. As the grip of the Kanima was gone and Jackson was just that, Jackson. He could feel how she stepped away and a part of him screamed for her to not, to. But the other stayed silent, the dominant, the regretful part.

”Jackson” the coach's voice took him out of memory lane and back to the moment, he was holding a clipboard. Jackson knew from all the years with the coach, that he was probably scouting new people for the lacrosse team. With most of them having graduated. “Hey coach” he simply smirked at the man, who'd done his best to train a bunch of hormonal teenagers. If he thought about it, he quite liked the coach, not just because of his sense of humor and sarcasm, but because he'd truly seen how good Jackson was at what he was doing. And because somehow Jackson had always felt home in the lacrosse team. They chatted a little, the coach catching him up on the team and the happenings. They talked about Danny and Jackson's plan of moving to NYC and how he was applying for a special field, of course with a position in the university's lacrosse team.

The coach parted from him, to go on the field, although he'd offered Jackson to come by and demonstrate to the bunch of 'losers' how it's done correctly. Jackson had to decline however, as he had many stops to make, before the day or days were done for him. Places to be, people to see. Something like that. He left the high school, after sitting underneath his locker for a while. It had something freeing to be able to close the chapter of high-school. But it somehow had something unsettling too, there were a lot of changes he'd missed. And a lot of things he'd wished he'd seen or been told of at least.

Leaving the high-school, Jackson walked down the main road of Beacon Hills, the one that lead through the complete town. Not that Beacon Hills was anything bigger, than the DVD-rent shop, the diner with those stupid curly fries Stiles liked, the graveyard, a few shops, the veterinarian, the club that had more damage than actual income and the hale grounds. Jackson had memories and places to be. He had chapters to close and people to say goodbye to. And his journey felt right at the beginning, when he'd been at a few places already.

His feet carried him across the parking lot of the DVD-rent and for a second he stopped, looked to his left and waited. But there was no silver Porsche with Lydia in it, there was no disturbing sound in the DVD shop, or the huge wolf monster like creature jumping through the window. No the shop was run down, the window nailed close with a few wooden tilings. Nothing showed of Peter's attack, or was it a warning? On him and Lydia back then, not a single bit and somehow he felt so small. In that moment, he understood what time could do. And what people were so used to. Pass quickly, make them forget, make it a memory in someone's head. Bound to fade, bound to be altered by the mind and at one point forgotten.

He made a stop at the diner, that he never had actually liked. Not the soggy salad, the oily french fries or the tasteless milkshake. But maybe that had been old Jackson, the Jackson that had hated Beacon Hills, that had wanted to leave. The Jackson who thought he'd have to prove his worth to his family, to be feared and adored, instead of loved and respected. The Jackson that confused a few words here and there, their meaning forgotten in a messed up mind of a teenager, too full of himself.

Ordering the oily fries – not curly ones, obviously – and the tasteless milkshake it made him think of his first time there. And maybe after he'd fallen out with her, things had started to suck? Maybe that was why it had been oily and tasteless to him. Because she had loved them, the fries with too much ketchup. The Milkshake with a huge topping of whipped cream. He dipped the fries into too much ketchup and ate them, occasionally dipping one salty fry into his milkshake to mimic her. It tasted better than his imagination had made it to be, if he was honest it tasted damn amazing.

You only know what you're missing, once you can't have it anymore. Maybe because he couldn't have her comment on the taste anymore, couldn't have her pester him to take her there, that he'd started liking the taste or craved it. Jackson couldn't tell, but he was sitting at their usual spot. When High-school had been too big for them and their bodies too small, to be anything meaningful. When he'd been her best friend and she had been his. He could still see her form across from him, too big his jacket on her, because she had complained all day how cold it was. Jackson had always been bigger than her, his shoulder's wider than her's. Erica had always been too small.

”She used to come every single day, even after you stopped coming with her” the elderly Lady – by now she was a lot older, than she had been back then – who ran the shop commented. Leaning over the bar of the diner, she looked at him. “But a while ago she stopped...” the woman sighed a little to herself. Jackson didn't know what to reply to it, for a long while opting to think. A thing he had picked up from the UK, think before you talk. Think carefully and then say something, otherwise you might regret it. You did too many times in your life already. “I didn't know...” he then confessed and the woman could see how broken he was, because no teenager should sit like that. Not a single one, that had just graduated and left high-school for bigger and brighter things, should look this burdened by life. “We only learn to miss things, once we can't have them anymore. It goes for people as things.... and I should know...” she smiled kindly at him, before tending to new customers. And Jackson did understand for once.

**The day you slipped away Was the day I found it won't be the same**

He left money and an extra large tip for the lady, before getting up and leaving another chapter of his life behind. Memory lane was long, somehow it got longer the more he thought about it. But it also was freeing, in a way he would have never expected. Letting go was difficult, but being held back would be even more.

**Nana, nanana, nana**   
**I didn't get around to kiss you, goodbye on the hand**   
**I wish that I could see you again, I know that I can't**   
**I hope you can hear me, 'cause I remember it clearly**

The next stop on his walk, was of course the club. How could he not stop there? At the place where he'd almost murdered his best friend? He'd killed someone, he'd danced with her. He'd threatened them, got his throat slashed and fought against almost every single one with them. Funny how a club, they should have never had access to, had been almost a main point in the happenings of his darkest year.

He paid the man at the front extra, to let him inside of the empty club. He was just going to look around for a few more minutes. Just get over with the pain in his chest, or so he hoped. As he walked down the stairs of the front, over the empty dance floor. For a minute he could close his eyes, pretend that there was music, pretend that she was dancing with him. Pretend that maybe, they all were alive and somehow made it through. And then.... He'd open his eyes again, see the empty dance floor, the silent club and the rundown location.

His hands slid over the DJ's spaces and he wondered. Wondered if their lives had been like this club, rotten on the inside, glam-ed up on the outside. Remembered the conversation he had had with Lydia and how they had been seated across from one another. Both had at one point loved one another, lost a love on another point and somehow found themselves there. Drinking coffee and talking calmly, no kissing, no heated sex. They were finally at a stage, where they valued this. Talking. And he could remember, how Lydia had asked him, if he had seen her. If he'd had the strength to go. He'd been thankful for her understanding eyes, when he'd shook his head. “I couldn't go to his either” and Jackson understood, for the first moment of his life, he could relate more than he had ever before.

Jackson left the club, with the same feeling he'd left the places before, there was somewhat closure. At knowing he could see those places a final time, remember things and put them away. A storage for memories, nothing more nothing less. One day maybe written down, or told to his children in the future, or forgotten in the back of his mind. Tanned hands ran through his blonde hair, to the back of his neck, before the bulky doorman asked him to leave. He complied and walked out of the club. Down the street again and past several shops. Meaningless to him now.

He didn't go to the veterinarian, because that had never been his places to begin with, a place of memories for McCall. Jackson never had gotten to actually meet Deaton, or even befriend him. And he really didn't care for it at the moment, because he and Danny would leave anyway. Instead he walked out of town and into the woods. Now as a werewolf, someone in control of the beast inside of him, there was nothing scary about them. Just walking through the green and woody floor. Leaves a little slippery from the morning dew that was slowly sinking into the ground. Branches breaking underneath his heavy boots. And Jackson knew, could feel it, how he came closer to the place he had been bitten at. Like somehow, it was a connection undeniable, even if his alpha no longer existed.

The dull sound of his timberlands, that marched up the broken down stairs of the Hale house, sounded not nearly as loud as his heartbeat. Jackson always felt a little nervous around the house, maybe it was what had happened in there, before he'd even known Derek. Or because it was looming all alone in the forest, like someone had forgotten it. Like someone had forgotten everything. He pushed the scratched and half painted door open, entering it to stand in the small hallway. Looking around, he could remember the Argents, him shouting at Derek to do something. Him getting the bite, them killing Peter outside. Things had happened, things had changed and for a second his wolf was mourning inside of him. Changing the thinking expression of the young man into one of mourning. His wolf knew the alpha was no longer, couldn't feel the pull anymore, knew the betas were gone and Isaac unable to reach with their connection. They were the only small memento of the Hale pack.

Erica had been part of the pack, Erica had been part of him at a point. His heart beat a little faster at the thought of her smile, back when he'd been Jacks and she'd been Eri. When they had played in the backyard of her parents, or his. Depending on which parent had picked them up. How they had shared food, stories and tears. How he'd comforted her after her first seizure. How he'd beat up the dude who'd made a video of her and put it on YouTube. Making him take it down and Danny hack into the computers to delete it from existence. How Danny had gotten caught, but had been left with just a admonition. Thanks to Jackson's father and the age Danny had been.

Apologies of Jackson's, flying past his best friend. Because Danny understood and would have done it over and over again for Jackson, because Danny himself also cared for Erica, even if not as deeply as Jackson, he did. How they had somehow watched out for her from afar, despite popularity and ego, she was still 'Eri'. Even if only in his mind, even if there was no more chances to call her that. No more right for him to call her that. He'd failed her pretty much, ever since the first fight of theirs.

**The day you slipped away**   
**Was the day I found it won't be the same**

He left the Hale house, once again the feeling of having finished another chapter, lingering in the air. It was like reading a book, Jackson had done much reading in England. It was the anticipation of the next chapter, the regret of the chapter behind. His life was like a book to him now, chapters of laughter, of regret, chapters of happiness and sadness. Life was a lot like a book, with a few exceptions. No one wrote it for you, it just happened, each line would appear in it, as you lived it. You could not skip any chapters, not sneak a peak of the grand finale. And you could not bookmark it, leave it on a shelf to pick it up again.

The wolf in him prevented him from tiring out, he could walk a long while without even feeling it. Right now Jackson didn't feel tired, he actually felt like he could walk another day. Maybe it was the wish to finally be done with the worst part of the walk, or the wish to talk to her a final time. Before he'd never return to Beacon Hills. Before Beacon Hills itself would be a closed chapter of the book labeled as “Jackson Whittemore.”. He kept walking, till he arrived at the archway that had in rusty letters “Graveyard” stated. Like no one could tell from the headstones and the somewhat gloomy atmosphere.

However everything about that town had somewhat turned gloomy. Jackson had a few things he needed to give to the people in this place. Which was why he'd parked his car in front of the graveyard and walked through the whole town, before returning. He bent his body to reach behind his driver seat, instead of simply pushing it down. Sometimes he was a person like that, going the difficult route, when things were far easier. Reaching behind he pulled out a few things, arms somewhat full. Closing the door with his hip he didn't bother to lock it, no one would steal a werewolf's car, without the wolf noticing anyway.

The first stop was his parents, his actual birth parents. A father he'd never gotten to meet and a mother, kept alive to give birth to him. He couldn't say he missed them, because he'd never met them. But he could say a few other things. How he'd wish for them to rest in peace, for them to actually understand that he was their son, even if he'd grown up with other people. Two parents who had loved them in their stead. That he'd been confused and lost for a whole portion of his life, because he thought it had been his fault. But that he now slowly came to terms, that it wasn't. That life was just weird and unexplainable. And that growing up without knowing them, wasn't as bad as he thought it had been.

Sure he would have liked to know how it would have been, but he also had had a life. And he'd had had parents who'd loved him, whom he'd pushed away and pulled back. After acknowledging that sometimes, things were as simple as they looked, that they worked hard to make him happy. That he'd worked just as hard to make them happy. That Mr. and Mrs. Whittemore, were his parents, it however never made him forget his biological parents. “I am yours and I am theirs.... I just want both of you to be proud of me... but it's okay if you're not. Because at the same time, I know my mom and dad are proud of me... and I... I refused to say 'I love you' because … I thought that if I loved them they could leave, that they would probably leave just like you did. And then I …. I did a lot of horrible things, a lot I couldn't control, others I could....” he took a deep breath and put down both bouquets of flowers on each grave.

”Some people I was able to ask for forgiveness, other's I hope I might somehow get.... It made me understand, that loving someone... Is a way of keeping them alive, even when they're no longer... So I do love both of you... but I also love my parents and in a totally brotherly way I do love Danny...” he smiled a little, patted each headstone and got up from the crouching position he had gotten into, to talk to them.

His feet carried him away from the headstones, over to another place he never thought he would ever venture to. The Argents owned a part of the graveyard, where they buried their family members. He knew by now that Kate's grave was empty, new however, that Allison's wasn't. Coming down to another crouching position, he let his hand rest on the cold marble. “You shouldn't have died... but then again a lot of people shouldn't have...” he said and heaved a heavy sigh. “It's weird, to not sit next to you on that floor and talk. I kind of liked it... in a friendly way... The swimming and the fun we had...” his eyes looked over the inscription of the gravestone. Of the new words Allison had picked for her family, to value as a code, the one Chris Argent lived by now. “You did save your friends and you did change the hunters.... It's a lot for someone who's been so young... who's gone from us for so early...” he chuckled a little to himself. “I wanted to come back to apologize...”

His head fell a little forward, his teeth buried in his lower lip. Maybe it hit him harder than the stones of his parents, because he actually had known Allison. Because he knew how her laughter had sounded, or how her voice had been panicky whenever she thought Scott was in danger. How she had swung bow and arrow to defend them, to protect her friends. Lydia had told him how she had died and even knowing that it was heroic, that it was in a way that everyone would love to one day die. It shouldn't have been so early.... He could imagine a tiny bit... how Stiles felt, just a little. Because killing strangers, would never come close to killing your friend.

”I wasn't a good friend in a lot of ways. But.... you should know... I considered you one of my friends.... and I'm grateful we met...” leaving the headstone behind, his feet grew heavier with each step. His hand playing with the key in his jeans pocket, his right hand holding the other items he had brought along. He'd never owned anything from Allison, nor would he have known what to leave with her, but words of apology and memory.

**I've had my wake up, won't you wake up**   
**I keep asking why?**   
**And I can't take it it wasn't fake it**   
**It happened you passed by**

With each step he came closer to the heavy gates, that held the secluded area of the graveyard. It was private and locked. But Jackson had gotten the key from Derek a few days prior. To find the ex-alpha had been quite difficult, but it had made it worth it. Getting the key, being able to see the two headstones no one knew of, no one could ever know of.Remembering the 'missing posters' and wanting to tell the parents, that it was a search for naught. That their children would never return home, not now and not ever in the future.

He unlocked the gate and walked in, before closing it with the same hand. To move forward, past many Hale graves, to the center, where Talia had been buried, Laura and Derek's father. Right next to them were two newer headstones, Jackson could clearly see that they were still whole and shining. The marble polished and while all the other graves had been maintained these two showed, that they were relatively new.

Letting the letterman jacket was dropped on top of Boyd's grave, his name in thick letters across the back, together with a number on the front. Boyd hadn't been an official member of the lacrosse team. And Jackson had never spent much time with him, he had actually pretty much not known Boyd. But the respect was deeper than anything else could ever go. Lydia had told him everything that had happened during his absence. How Boyd had protected Erica against Allison, when everything had gone crazy. How he had tried in the vault, where the alphas had them hostage.

His strength during the alpha battles and how he'd died in Derek's arms. The wolf in him was crying, clawing at the insides of the young man, who'd had too many deaths in his life to know how to handle it. Gone were the strong words, the thoughts of closure he had thought he had had. And he hadn't even seen her stone yet. Just sitting here, in front of the man that he hadn't been back then. The one who had protected her, held her trembling hand, had known her screams and tears, as much as her sarcasm and laughter. Boyd had not deserved to die, maybe even less than any other person, as horrible as he sounded in his head. Maybe it was the wolf inside of him, or the human or …. maybe it was just the knowledge, that he'd not been there.

”You deserved it more, than anyone else did...” he simply said and bit back the tears, that were on the brink of falling. Moving a little to the right her name was almost jumping at him. Erica Ryes Hale. He'd even given them his family's name, the pack name. His hand reaching into his pocket to pull out a stupid ribbon. He held it tightly in his hands, like it could get carried away by the wind. Though there was no wind in the first place. His eyes trailed over her name, the inscription of the headstone and the doves perfectly formed into the stone. “I don't even know where to begin...” he said and had to hold back a broken sound. Not only the wolf was now roaring to be let out, to howl for the lost ones, to curl up and mourn them. But also the human, the friend, the brother, the child, that was inside of him.

”I don't even know if you can hear me, if there is a heaven... But if there is, god if you can hear me. I am sorry.... I am so sorry...” he could feel the tears finally spilling, could feel them pearl from his eyelashes and drop onto his cheek, to run down his cheekbones and collect at his chin. Fall onto his shirt and stain the white button up, with grey dots. “I held onto this.... For fucks sake...” using the back of his hand he tried to wipe away the tears. Taking a deep breath. “I... you... We...” another deep breath. “We were around six? Maybe seven?” he could feel the humorless chuckle at the back of his throat. “We were at mine and you insisted on me braiding your hair, because it had been me who'd pulled at the ribbon, during our game of tag. And I sucked so much at it.....” he chuckled now, a real one. Because the memory of her demanding big brown eyes, her curly slightly bushy hair and his frustration , because how would a six year old know how to braid.

”Your mom picked you up, before I could even try again. And you left it at mine.... We fell apart after that.... I always tried to give it back to you, wanted to apologize for the things I said, wanted to try and mend things...” he licked over his dry lips and had to pause, for a deep intake of breath. Why was it so hard,to speak to someone who wasn't there? Why could he not just say it in one go?

”I even learned to braid.... It's so stupid...” he looked at the dove that was sprouting from the headstone, it's wing curving over the top right and somewhat forming an archway. Tying the ribbon around the wing, creating a bow, that was tied well enough, to not fly away with the wind. He sat back on the ground, not minding the dirt that was staining his jeans or his hands. “There are so many things I want to apologize for, to ask your forgiveness for. … But what's the point? I thought I could walk through it all and close it.... but …. god damn it... I miss you...” his lips trembled with each word said. “I miss you with every passing day, I missed you in London, when I became the Kanima, when I was with Lydia and even before that.... I missed you so much....”

His hands came to rest in his lap, his eyes averted from her grave. ”Derek and Lydia told me how you fought, how you died... And....why... why is it that you saved everyone, but yourself? God damn it Erica... you... you saved me, when I thought I was lost, you saved Boyd from loneliness and I bet even that idiot Isaac, who's hiding in France.... you tried to protect Boyd in that vault..... and we all failed you, one by one, we failed you...” the tears fell again and Jackson had to lift his head to the heaven's, to blink his vision clear.

For a long while Jackson, just sat there and cried. He let the thoughts run, said something when he felt like saying it. Told Erica memories he could remember and things he found idiotic. He told her about Great Britain and how he and Danny planned their future away from Beacon Hills. How it had been a decision based on the wish to be as far away from the curse that Beacon Hills was as possible. How he still was an idiot sometimes and sometimes a better version of himself.

**Now you're gone, now you're gone**   
**There you go, there you go**   
**Somewhere I can't bring you back**

Packing the car with their suitcases, all the boxes already with the moving van. Jackson looked at his parents, who were standing next to the 'sold' house. They had decided to no longer stay in Beacon Hills, moving to San Francisco and promised to visit their son in NYC. He looked at them and for a moment he felt like the little boy again, that had been playing with the cars his dad had bought him. Was eating the pie his mother had tried to bake and had failed at. Before she had packed him into the car, to get him the best apple pie of the damn town. And while he hugged each of them, he whispered the words, he had deprived them off of, half of his yet short life. “I love you mom...” an astonished Mrs. Whittemore, that replied the same three words to him and then a hug for his dad, with the same words and the same reaction.

Danny had already told his parents goodbye and was waiting for him in the car, he waved at them before finally taking a seat in Danny's car. His own he had already gotten to NYC and the two had decided to take the trip to NYC, as some kind of road trip. Halt wherever, sleep whenever, eat and see things. “You sure....” Danny seemed to ask that a lot lately, the blonde and blue eyed boy rolled his eyes. Before letting his hand rest on his best friend's shoulder. “Never been any more sure of anything, than this...” he said and Danny nodded. Because Danny too, had lost someone back then, when he'd been somewhat drawn to the wolf that had been his boyfriend for some time. He'd let him go a long while ago, yet there were things that were still pulling at his heart when he thought about the young man. He would never fully know what Jackson went through. Maybe because Jackson wouldn't talk about it, or because he wouldn't be able to know what it felt like. But Danny knew, he would be there for his best friend.

Because Jackson would never know, how much it had meant to Danny, when he'd stood up for him. When he'd taken on every single guy, that thought to mess with Danny, just because he was gay. How he'd seen him as “Danny” and nothing less. Jackson had been his best friend, his shoulder to lean on. And while many might have perceived him as a douchebag – God, Danny sometimes couldn't blame them – he knew a few who did not. A few who had made the effort to look past that, to have seen what was truly on the inside.

They both needed a new start and with the engine of the car, roaring to life and them driving off. The Whittemore's waving in the back of their rearview mirror, the streets passing them by. Jackson could tell as he was leaning his head against the window, he had closed all open chapters of his life. He had left behind the last memories of his life, as the lacrosse captain, as the Kanima, as Jacks and the boy who'd survived a car crash. He had left the memories of having been a brief part of the Hale pack and the knowledge that he would never return to those ways.

He wouldn't change completely sarcasm and the harshness of his character were still there, but he would try and be softer. Not in a subtle way, but he'd try and do right by people. Wanting to atone for what he'd done wrong in his past life, because if anything life was a lesson. Each and every day teaching you something. Either it was about one's character, about ones ways or even about other's around you. Jackson had learned to at least try and listen to his inner voice, to try and see the changes of life and the faults in himself.

It was an ever growing process, something that wasn't achieved from today and onward to tomorrow. But something that would bring him to a lot of regrettable moments and an equal amount of longed ones. He knew that NYC could be everything and maybe nothing at all, but with his best friend by his side, his family a phone call away. Jackson somehow felt like he could try and live... not just for him. But those he left behind and those he'd always keep in his mind.

**The day you slipped away**   
**Was the day I found it won't be the same**

**Nana, nanana, nana**   
**I miss you**


End file.
